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Bassists with Eric Clapton
- Thread starter IamGroot
- Start date
Go read up. Start with the Spencer Davis Group and follow his career and music and read/listen for yourself. And he is big buddies with EC, so at least it fits this category. I agree Winwood went cheesy 80s, but he gained a whole new following with those pop hits. Kind of like Chicago with the Cheesy 80s Cetera era. Different sound, whole different listener base.
I know Winwood. Most things I heard were very good indeed, but nothing was what I'd consider 'genius'. Same goes for Clapton. But very good indeed is still...Very good indeed!.
My favourite Winwood band was 'Traffic'. Really cool!
Ric Grech was the bassist for Blind Faith, the second one listed by the OP. On the Winwood/Clapton concert and album they used Willie Weeks on bass.
As for Cream, I don’t think Clapton has had a band since with three (or more) musicians on an equal level with such competing egos. That was the biggest reason for the breakup of Cream.
Didn't Eric try to get Steve Winwood in to Cream near the end, hoping an extra musician would provide a buffer between Jack and Ginger?
Imagine if he had, that would have had amazing potential.
Imagine if he had, that would have had amazing potential.
Jim Gordon is one of the great rock drummers. [period] His playing on their version of Little Wing is otherworldly. His list of other sessions tracks includes Nilsson’s Jump into the Fire, SD’s Ricky Don’t Loose that Number, and he practically invented hip-hop with his beat on Apache.
We just added Why Does Love Got To Be So Sad to our set list, and played it live for the first time last night. Super fun song to play and a real crowd pleaser. It went over well for us. We also play this one.
Yup, great drummer/bass combo with Radle and Gordon.
I liked Carl's work with Eric. ... He'd still be in the band if he didn't allow his distractions to get the better of him. Very strong and inventive player.
So Anyway, Jim Gordon had quite a resume before and after Clapton. I think he's currently locked up.
Agree on Carl Radle... he's a favorite. Gone too soon.
Agree on Carl Radle... he's a favorite. Gone too soon.
If you check the credits on the first four Traffic albums, you'll see he played the bass guitar parts, although there was a lot of keyboard bass, too. He was pretty rudimentary, he really favored the R-5-b7-octave box. Playing along with Traffic records was where I learned about all the possible permutations of those four notes.
In the original quartet, Dave Mason played bass guitar on gigs when Winwood was on guitar. Winwood played keyboard bass when Mason was on guitar.
As a trio, it was all keyboard bass...Chris Wood played it when Winwood was on guitar.
After John Barleycorn, Traffic had an actual bassist...Ric Grech, David Hood (from Muscle Shoals) and Rosko Gee.
In his recent tours, Winwood is back to a quartet and it's all keyboard bass again. The woodwind player gets on the organ when Winwood is on guitar.
In his autobiography he says he tried to get Winwood in at the beginning of Cream, but Ginger was insistent that it be a trio.
Yes, Steve Winwood's main instrument is probably keyboards, but he's also an excellent guitar player and has sometimes played bass and drums in the studio. Add to that his great singing and writing abilities and you have one helluva talented musician.
Steve Winwood plays bass as well, and in Blind Faith he did play some bass with them. You'd have to go to Wikipedia to find specific tracks or timelines, but I know he did play bass with them.
